


White Flag

by serenissima (killalla)



Category: Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-18
Updated: 2019-12-18
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:27:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21842149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/killalla/pseuds/serenissima
Summary: She's got a ship to save.
Relationships: Molly (Rivers of London) & Thomas Nightingale, Peter Grant & Molly, Peter Grant & Thomas Nightingale
Comments: 7
Kudos: 62
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	White Flag

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fajrdrako](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fajrdrako/gifts).



> Note: This story references the "Tales from the Folly" bonus strip, "Ships in the Night," from Issue #2 of the Action at a Distance comic, in which it is revealed that Molly writes stories about Grant and Nightingale as a romantic couple.

I. Heart of Oak

What they all forget is that she has been here longer than any of them. Sometimes, she forgets it herself, as time passes differently in the Bright World, and she was banished from the Hill long enough ago that she cannot remember much about the time before she came Home – just a vague memory of Harry, the Chinaman-who-wasn’t, dark basements, cramped attics and crying children.

From the moment she crossed its threshold, in the company of the Isaacs, she knew that the Folly would be hers. Her kind need anchors, places or people, and when she looked up to the vaulting dome of the rotunda overhead, ran her hands over the smooth oak panels of its walls, and felt the marble tiles, cool beneath her feet, she felt the call of Home. She has kept it and its inhabitants under her care ever since. 

English wizards have their faults, and are notorious for their eccentricity, but it at least meant they were never bothered by her otherness. Some of them ignored her, as any servant-below-stairs, albeit an uncanny one. Others called her brownie or silkie, and following the old rituals, left her small gifts – fresh cream in a mug on the mantelpiece, a bouquet of hawthorn flowers and autumn leaves on the staircase. 

Old Master Barnabas taught her letters and reckoning, as well as a smattering of Latin and Greek, for which she will always be grateful. Even if she cannot speak the words, they speak to her, and she has since explored everything of interest in the Folly’s many libraries. Another, Master Elliot, even courted her in a curious fashion, leaving lengthy poems likening her hair to seaweed on a windswept beach, and her teeth to silver needles. 

II. Beat to Quarters

In the beginning, Thomas wasn’t even one of her favourites, although she liked him well enough – he was polite, and respectful, if at times benignly indifferent in the way of gentlemen with their servants. He left no gifts or poems, but did thank her when she brought the tea, or breakfast. Thoughtful, quiet, almost diffident at times, but possessed of a certain calm strength - it was clear from the beginning that he would be a teacher, a mentor, a leader in war and perhaps, in peace as well. After Ettersberg, however, when the flower of English wizardry returned, half broken in body and near the rest broken in spirit - well, it was then that she realised it would fall to the Nightingale to serve as the Eldest and perhaps also the Last.

It was in that time, seemingly always winter in her memory, that she came to know him, as their habits and presence grew around each other, entwining in the way of branches of neighbouring trees. Decades that were measured in countless cups of tea – kippers or kedgeree at breakfast, sandwiches at lunch (devilled ham, cheese and pickle), and roast dinners – beef, pork or lamb, with fish on Fridays for variety. He came to trust in her ability to manage the household, and so long as beds were made, meals were served and clothes mended and freshly laundered, he left her to her own devices. She came to grasp the horrors of human conflict, beyond simply death and destruction, and to understand that for Thomas, the only healing would be in routine, silence and time. These, at least, were all supports she was eminently able to provide. 

Seemingly, the pattern was set, with a long decline and fall to follow. Before long it was only the two of them, skittering like marbles in a box. The cats and the rats of the city kept her informed of changes in the Bright World, but inside, it remained 1942. It was only when he ceased to age and then, in turn began to grow young again, that the thought came that the Nightingale could not end his watch so easily. That there must always be an Eldest, a Wizard of London. In that grey time, it was perhaps the one thing that kept him going - the knowledge if he died, when he died, the Folly would die with him. Molly is never sure if he realised she would be lost as well, her Home empty and her bond dissolved.

So she was pleased indeed when a young Constable Peter Grant crossed the threshold, becoming one of her charges. Not least because he rightfully displayed a healthy respect for her, perhaps even a hint of fear, which she found most endearing. Whereas past apprentices had viewed her as servant and fae, he saw her through the modern lenses of creepypasta and Japanese anime. It certainly helped that his arrival was quickly followed by others, both of the Bright World and of the demimonde, including one of the daughters of Mama Thames herself. Best of all, he brought her the gift of technology, and with the internet, a whole world of correspondents, so endless in their variety of character and circumstance. “Lord, what fools these mortals be!" 

But more importantly, she saw the change that Peter wrought in the Nightingale. Oh, there was the computers, and the pop culture references, which she could follow soon enough, but it was also notable in an unbending, the return of a certain colour and wry humour that she remembered from his own apprentice days. The tragic war hero reemerged into London as a wise veteran, both magical and military. In their camaraderie she saw a new generation, and a new beginning for the Folly - the endurance of Home.

III. Save Our Ship

Now, she has a new mission. There will be more apprentices, more wizards, and more magic in her Home - she is determined, there must be. But in order to ensure it, she must be certain of that central bond, the Master and Apprentice that reawakened the Folly's new spring. For it will take a full ten years for Peter to complete his training, and modern lives run faster and burn quicker, more dynamic and sudden in their changes. Thus, she has her own plans for how to bind him to the Nightingale and to the Folly. And in this, her correspondents and communities have been most helpful with myriad suggestions.

She wants them to stay together. She wants them to be happy. And she will see them happy, even if she has to write their forever after herself. For the Folly, and for Home.

(It might be for the best if Peter never finds her online fiction account, though.)


End file.
